Current Mercedes

Mercedes GP

FIA Entry: Mercedes GP Petronas F1 Team
Car 7: Michael Schumacher
Car 8: Nico Rosberg
Engine: Mercedes V8
Team Principal: Ross Brawn
Technical Director: Bob Bell
Race Engineer Car 7: Mark Slade
Race Engineer Car 8: Tony Ross

Stats as of end 2010

First Entered 2010
Races Entered 19
Race Wins 0
Pole Positions 0
Fastest Laps 0
Driver World Championships 0
Constructor World Championships 0

Team History

The Mercedes team history splits into two parts. In 1954 the famous pre-war Silver Arrows entered the F1 world championship and recorded a 1-2 at their first race. Fangio went on to win the drivers championship that year and again in 1955. Mercedes withdrew at the end of the 1955 season after the accident which killed 80 spectators at Le Mans which involved one of their cars.

The current team entered F1 in 2010 after Mercedes bought Brawn Grand Prix. Brawn Grand Prix, winners of the Drivers Championship, with Jenson Button, and the constructor’s championship in 2009, grew out of the ashes of Honda’s F1 entry after Honda had withdrawn from F1 at the end of the 2008 season after only a single Grand Prix win for Button in Hungary 2006.

Prior to the Honda takeover in 2006 the team had raced under the name of British America racing which had acquired the assets and race entry of the Tyrrell F1 team in 1999. BAR competed in 118 races without a single victory. The high points for the team were 2 pole positions (both for Button – San Marino 2004 and Canada 2005) and 2nd in the constructors championship in 2004.

Tyrrell were amongst the most successful private F1 teams taking part in 463 Grands Prix, scoring 33 victories and 3 Drivers Championships, all with Jackie Stewart.

2010

Having replaced Button and Barrichello with Nico Rosberg and 7 times WDC Michael Schumacher many expected great things of the new Mercedes team in 2010 but they had an indifferent season.

Rosberg managed 3 podiums for the team but Schumacher, coming back from retirement, struggled with the new cars, tyres and limited testing under the revised regulations. The team finished 4th in the Constructors Championship.

2011

For 2011 Mercedes retain the same driver line up and are hoping for better things from their MGP W02 chassis.
 
Encouraging news from Mercedes regarding the upgrades for the 2013 WO4. Let's hope that the new wind tunnel figures are correct, and also the problem of excessive heating of the rear tires have been solved, with their Red Bull type Coanda solution.

This season, Lewis and Nico may just not be scrambling around with the mid-fielders as many have suggested, but right at the front with the big boys..........:chuffed:

http://mercamgf1-fans.com/2012/12/27/the-team-we-need-to-find-three-seconds-to-be-competitive/
 
3 seconds can be made up in three upgrade packages, if you are Caterham.

I think the important thing is that the competition are not likely to stay still, and starting with more to make up may give more freedom in some ways, but a larger task overall.
 
All kidding aside, I assume Mercedes are talking about an average lap time. In which case 3 seconds represents a big deficit in pace and they certainly don't want to have that hanging round their neck at the start of the season. To put that into perspective Vettel's pole time in India was 1:25.283. His time in Q1 was 1:26.287. A lap time 3 seconds off of that would mean not making it into Q2. Even being just 3 sec's away from the pole time (1:28.283) would only have been good for 17th/18th on the grid. With that in mind I'm starting to lose my optimism with regard to Mercedes hitting the ground running.
 
I read that, about three seconds to make up, some time ago, and that they'd already found half of that time. Then I couldn't believe what I'd read THREE SECONDS!! they weren't ever that far off! So I looked for the article again and couldn't find it. I put it down to my waning mental faculties LOL . Maybe I'd had too much wine and dreamt it. But it looks like it was said. Maybe Ross' thinking is, if we make up three seconds, we'll absolutely have the best car, no ifs and buts. Aiming high :D
 
I believe from what I remember that the three seconds is not the deficit from last season alone, but also allows for other teams improvements on last year. Red Bull for instance have been rumoured to have already improved by a second on last years car.

three seconds should put them nicely in the mix, providing the numbers stack up. Worth bearing in mind that it is all just data with no full wind tunnel work ups and no track time, but all in the right direction.
 
racecub - One of the cars was quite close at Austin:

[TH]Position[/TH][TH][/TH][TH]Driver[/TH][TH]Time[/TH][TH]Gap to Pole[/TH][TR1][TD1]1[/TD1][TD1]Q3[/TD1][TD1]S. Vettel[/TD1][TD1]1:35.657[/TD1][TD1] - [/TD1][/TR1][TR2][TD1]7[/TD1][TD1]Q3[/TD1][TD1]M. Schumacher[/TD1][TD1]1:36.734[/TD1][TD1]+ 1.137[/TD1][/TR2][TR2][TD1]17[/TD1][TD1]Q2[/TD1][TD1]N. Rosberg[/TD1][TD1]1:38.501[/TD1][TD1]+ 2.844[/TD1][/TR2]
 
Yep, looks like it was. But I'd think that was the exception rather than the rule. You could probably find one off examples where most teams were way off the pace for one reason or another. I'd have thought the usual gap, or an average gap, for mercedes, from the front funning car would have been much less. But as someone says, Brawn was factoring in progress other teams will make up to the start of the season. And maybe he's adding a bit on just to be sure ;)
 
*Cough* http://cliptheapex.com/threads/the-...-at-progress-from-2008-2012.5847/#post-175135

Mercedes average gap to pole of fastest car across 2012:
1st quarter: 0.432s
2nd quarter: 0.348s
3rd quarter: 1.209s
4th quarter: 0.980s

Pretty spectacular second half slump but they were never much more than a second away on average, at least on qualifying pace. If they could gain 3s in qualifying compared to their rivals than they'd be in for a great 2013 but I suspect that's just a tad optimistic!
 
Trends weren't good last year, but there were good reasons. Without those circumstances the gap would have remained much closer, and as F1ang-o says...now they have Lewis :D
But yeah! Bring on 2014,
 
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